There are many patient groups who may refuse blood products; the most well known amongst them is the Jehovah's Witness faith. Treatment of anaemia and bleeding in such patients presents a challenge to medical, anaesthetic, and surgical teams. This review examines the perioperative issues and management of Jehovah's Witnesses. The history and beliefs of Jehovah's Witnesses are outlined together with their impact on ethics and the law, and different management options throughout the perioperative period are discussed.

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The adjusted difference in mean time for tracheal intubation was 60.9 (95% CI 20.5-101.3; p = 0.003) seconds faster in the videolaryngoscope group. We found no other statistically significant differences.Although this study lacks the statistical power to compare secondary outcomes between groups, we are confident that videolaryngocopy enables significantly faster tracheal intubation in bariatric patients with predicted difficult airways compared to fibreoptic bronchoscopy. It is unlikely that this resulted from differences in sedation or topical anesthesia, as the bispectral indices and airway reaction scores were comparable between the groups. We would welcome confirmation of our findings by other researchers.

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